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Howard, Lohse power Phillies to key win over Braves

Sep 5, 2007 - 4:24 AM By Phil Foley PA SportsTicker Contributing Writer

ATLANTA (Ticker) - Ryan Howard and Kyle Lohse helped the Philadelphia Phillies win a crucial game down the stretch.

Howard smashed a two-run homer and Lohse pitched well into the seventh inning to lead the Phillies to a 5-2 win over the Atlanta Braves on Tuesday.

Philadelphia (73-65) has struggled, losing three straight, after sweeping four games from the New York Mets (78-60) last week to cut the edge to two games in the National League East Division.

The Phillies entered Tuesday five games behind the Mets and also trailed the Arizona Diamondbacks (76-63) by three games in the race for the wild card.

Not wanting to fall further behind in the pennant chase, Howard and the Phillies came out swinging.

The lefthanded slugger crushed Atlanta starter Buddy Carlyle's 2-1 pitch 414-feet into the left centerfield bleachers for his 37th homer of the season to give Philadelphia a 2-0 edge.

"We had three tough games," Howard said of the losing streak. "We really needed that one to right the ship a little bit and get things going in the right direction."

One frame later, it was catcher Carlos Ruiz's chance to homer off Carlyle (8-6), who had allowed 10 homers in his last 10 starts. The 28-year old Panamanian Ruiz connected for his fifth homer of the season off the 29-year old Atlanta journeyman to extend the lead to 3-0.

Ruiz added a sacrifice fly one frame later for a 4-1 edge. Aaron Rowand capped the scoring with an RBI single in the ninth.

The runs were more than enough for Lohse (8-12), who allowed two runs and eight hits, walked one and struck out five in 6 2/3 solid frames. The righthander, who was acquired from the Cincinnati Reds at the trade deadline, improved to 2-0 with a 4.06 ERA in seven starts since joining the Phillies.

"This is when you enjoy playing baseball," Lohse said. "Every game and every pitch makes the difference."

The Phillies have won five of the 28-year old righthander's seven starts.

"(It'd be) nice to get those wins to eventually get to .500," Lohse said. "But the bottom line is the team won. I'm not going to get selfish and say I wanted all those wins."

Lohse surrendered a solo blast to the 35-year old Jones, the slugger's 23rd of the season, in the fourth before getting out of bases-loaded, no-out jam in the fifth.

But as has been typical with the bumbling Braves of late, their offense could not muster much of a rally.

Atlanta, which has loaded the bases with no or one outs in five times in their past four contests, has managed to score more than one run in just one of those opportunities.

Tuesday was no different.

Atlanta led off the frame with successive singles by Andruw Jones, Yunel Escobar and pinch hitter Scott Thorman to load the bases.

But Lohse quickly induced the struggling Willie Harris, who was hitless in his last 20 at-bats entering this one, to pop to second and retired Kelly Johnson on a pop out to third.

"I made a couple good pitches (to load the bases), they kept finding holes," Lohse said. "I felt that if I kept pitching like I have been throwing, something good's going to happen. I got those two infield pop ups."

After forcing in a run by walking Chipper Jones to cut the lead to 4-2, the righthander got Mark Teixeira, the reigning NL Player of the Month, to ground out to end the threat.

"I'm not going to complain about giving up one run in that situation," Lohse said. "I knew what I needed to do when I faced (Teixeira). We stuck to the game plan and it worked tonight."

"We had the bases loaded and no outs again," Braves manager Bobby Cox said. "We finally got a walk-in and nothing else. We really have to start capitalizing with men on base."

As the lost opportunities mount, so does the frustration level in the Atlanta dugout.

"You're going to see frustration from now on as long as the officiating is abysmal," Chipper Jones said. "Major League Baseball ought to be ashamed. It's abysmal. It's awful. Not all of them but some of them. It's awful."

"The first pitch to me with the bases loaded was in my batter's box, inside. Now you tell me how I'm supposed to hit that. We have to get Ques Tec here in this ball park. We've got to. Umpires have got to be held accountable. That's Little League World Series stuff right there. It's a joke. I'm tired of it. And baseball can fine me whatever they want. I do not care. Somebody's got to say something."

J.C. Romero recorded the last out of the seventh, Tom Gordon hurled a perfect eighth, and closer Brett Myers allowed one hit in the ninth to record his 14th save.

Carlyle allowed three runs and four hits, walked three and struck out one in 1 2/3 frames - the shortest start of the his career.

Andruw Jones had three hits a piece for the Braves (70-69), who fell 8 1/2 games behind the New York Mets in the NL East.